María Elvira Balcells

Biographic Data

ID9064021
NAMEMaría Elvira Balcells
GIVEN NAMESMaría Elvira
FAMILY NAMEBalcells
SIGNATUREBALCELLS M E
VERIFIEDNo
TOTAL WORKS7
TOTAL CITATIONS0
WORKS AS AUTHOR0
WORKS AS EDITOR7
FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR2021
LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR2025
H-INDEX0

  • Self-reported Covid-19 severity among persons with tuberculosis infection in western Kenya, 2021

    Open AccessHellen C Barsosio, Brian Tangara et al.EDITORARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2025

    Whilst a quarter of the world’s population is estimated to be infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis , it is unknown whether TB infection (TBI) increases the risk of severe COVID-19, which is relevant in TB-endemic settings, especially where HIV co-infection is also common. A convenience cohort of symptomatic and asymptomatic COVID-19 patients aged 8–80 years in western Kenya was followed daily for 14 days to assess disease progression using th…

  • Usability and acceptability of a novel TB infection diagnostic test among key populations in Mexicali

    Open AccessAmanda Brumwell, Rosa Herrera et al.EDITORARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2025

    Tuberculin skin test (TST) remains the standard-of-care test for TB infection in many high TB-burden settings. Despite existing diagnostics overcoming challenges associated with TST implementation, there has been poor uptake programmatically. We conducted formative research into patients’ and providers’ perceptions of acceptability and usability of a novel IGRA test, called QIAreach QuantiFERON TB (or, QIAreach), compared to TST in a programmatic…

  • Mortality among persons with tuberculosis in Zambian hospitals

    Open AccessJosphat Bwembya, Ramya Kumar et al.EDITORARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2024

    Tuberculosis (TB) mortality in Zambia remains high at 86 per 100,000 populations, translating to approximately 15,000 TB-related deaths annually. We conducted a nationwide retrospective cohort study to understand predictors, time to death, and probable causes of mortality among persons on TB treatment in Zambia. We reviewed medical records for persons with TB registered in 54 purposively selected hospitals in Zambia between January and December 2…

  • Unmasking the truth

    Open AccessKaren A Grépin, Valerie Mueller et al.EDITORARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2023

    High levels of compliance with public health measures are critical to ensure a successful response to the COVID-19 pandemic and other public health emergencies. However, most data on compliance are self-reported and the tendency to overreport due to social desirability could yield biased estimates of actual compliance. A list experiment is a widely used method to estimate social desirability bias in self-reported estimates of sensitive behaviours…

  • Successful outcomes for patients with drug-resistant tuberculosis despite civil unrest and Covid-19 in Haiti

    Open AccessStalz Charles Vilbrun, Ariadne Souroutzidis et al.EDITORARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2023

    Globally, treatment outcomes for people with multi-drug/rifampin-resistant tuberculosis (MDR/RR-TB) are sub-optimal, with MDR/RR-TB programs further weakened due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and in Haiti, by severe civil unrest. We assessed the impact of these disruptions on treatment outcomes at GHESKIO, in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. We conducted a retrospective analysis including all adults (age ≥18 years) who initiated MDR/RR-TB treatment at GHESKIO …

  • Integrating interferon-gamma release assay testing into provision of tuberculosis preventive therapy is feasible in a tuberculosis high burden resource-limited setting

    Open AccessSimon Muchuro, Rita Makabayi‐Mugabe et al.EDITORARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2022

    The World Health Organization recommends the scale-up of tuberculosis preventive therapy (TPT) for persons at risk of developing active tuberculosis (TB) as a key component to end the global TB epidemic. We sought to determine the feasibility of integrating testing for latent TB infection (LTBI) using interferon-gamma release assays (IGRAs) into the provision of TPT in a resource-limited high TB burden setting. We conducted a parallel convergent …

  • The global burden of tuberculous meningitis in adults

    Open AccessPeter J Dodd, Muhammad Osman et al.EDITORARTICLEPLOS Global Public Health2021

    Tuberculous meningitis (TBM) is the most lethal form of tuberculosis. The incidence and mortality of TBM is unknown due to diagnostic challenges and limited disaggregated reporting of treated TBM by existing surveillance systems. We aimed to estimate the incidence and mortality of TBM in adults (15+ years) globally. Using national surveillance data from Brazil, South Africa, the United Kingdom, the United States of America, and Vietnam, we estima…